What I've learned.

First off, clarity comes in fleeting glimpses. Little teasers pinballed out of the way by things of preprogrammed importance. Which of course makes it difficult to build upon or act on, since as soon as you take a step forward life happens and the clarity is dissipated like a smoke ring at last call. But like last call, leaves us a little affected knowing we must be moving soon, stumbling about to somewhere, reluctantly giving into a lack of better options. And so for a moment I see clearly, and can maybe save this thought to be built upon when another moment of clarity appears through this smoke filled barfly life.

Angst abounds. I don't know if it's the pressures of the economy, or if its just that so many people I know are around my age, dealing with dashed illusions, promises made to a generation gone by that seemingly just didn't apply to ours. Regardless, I just don't know anyone not dealing with severe angst, and self doubt. We are a sick lot, if angst were alcohol we'd be lying in a gutter, begging for change for just one more drink of disillusionment.

Of course so am I. I am lost. In the great bar in the back streets of life, I am a barfly.

I think the first moment of clarity came much earlier than now, a realization that I really don't fit, and that all efforts to plug into the real world have left me a little more adrift, a little more out of sorts. A blog reader wouldn't have to read long to know this to be true.

What I realized was that societies definition of success just didn't fit, it was unfulfilling, uninspiring. I just didn't care about the carrot, the prizes offered, it wasn't a game I wanted to win. But that discovery was troubling. Because what then.? What now? Now what?

The second great moment of clarity came shortly thereafter. It's easy to spend much time pondering when adrift in a seemingless endless sea. And so I thought. And I considered. And nothing came to me. I simply didn't want anything. I didn't want to accomplish anything. I was left without direction, without inspiration, without purpose. And it suddenly dawned on me, that as a generation we've been taught to define ourselves by stuff, by titles, by rising on the ladder of the newly redefined Reaganesk version of the American Dream. We are what our portfolios say we are, we are worth what our home appraisal, and toys suggest we are worth. We are our boats, our houses, our Ipod, I phone, our cars, our houses, and our 401K. We are no longer people, with feelings, with dreams, with needs, instead; numbers, statistics, failures and successes. Angst ridden successes and failures. More failure, than success. Even success, seemed short lived, unfulfilling and in the end angst ridden. Cirrhosis of the soul.

And so in that second moment of clarity it seemed to me that what was really important was how we feel, how we love, and how we live. Yet our actions, our goals, and activities did not improve our underlying selves. Our basic needs, our humanity was starved. We got drunk on goodies and concoctions that just weren't good for us, and our selves. And our selves died of malnutrition. And our drunkenness turned from good times to poison.

In all good goals the bottom line is served. This basic business principle is the foundation of all buzzword management ideas, such as lean manufacturing. The idea is that an idea is good only so much as it increases the bottom line. In life, all goals are only good so much as they achieve the underlying desire. Basic emotional needs. Not pieces of paper, not stuff, but love, friendship, safety, peace, excitement, mattering. These are the things that are truly important, that if you feed will nourish you and strengthen you. And so it dawned on me in this second moment of clarity, that a goal was meaningless unless you could tie it back to a basic emotional need of importance. The bottom line items of life.

And so that set me on a journey for inspiration, a test run so to speak, a chance to see what things matter most to me. And there was success, but with that another moment of clarity which has led me to this post.

The bottom line items of life do not wait. You can not put them away. You can not hide from them. You can stuff them in a closet for a while, but they are not quiet things. They will rattle, scream, whimper, demand and throw tantrums every time you walk by that closet. They will pester you until you let them out, when they come out they will be angry, they will be vengeful, and then you must deal with them. If ignored, if not treated as a bottom line item, if pushed off as secondary to misguided goals will derail at every chance they have. Because those things are life. You can try and ignore them, you can remain intoxicated on lies of abundance, you can be a barfly to life. But you can not flourish, you can not be truly healthy until you put these things front and center. If you make them your bottom line items. If you decide to live.

And so in this moment of clarity, I learned what has oft been said, but now I see clearer. Life is not one goal after another. Life is a journey, life is happening everyday, all the time. Bottom line needs are relevant every second of the day, and they are the most important things every second of the day. Life must be lived to enhance the journey, and not to delay it, not to push it aside for stuff and sideways accomplishments. Not to stay inebriated on false promises and false goals that do not nourish the soul, but to shove aside the crutch, the concoction that destroys, and to feed your true self.

The difficulty, the necessity, is honesty. Being honest with yourself, what really matters to you. What makes you happy, what satisfies the you. It doesn't have to pretty. It doesn't have to have an ounce of altruism. It can be shallow, or deep. It can be needy, or selfish. Ultimately it has to be selfish. But it must be true, and it must be you.